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Glad to report that Oksijan continues its march through the international film festival scene, thanks to the help of our friends at Festival Formula who are handling the insanely complicated submissions process.

So glad that the vitally important story of Ahmad’s fight for survival is being shown around the world – hopefully making people think about what more we can do to help the millions of child refugees like him.

Here’s a place to start – offer whatever help you can to the charities Help Refugees and Meena, both of whom were crucial to the effort to save Ahmad and the 14 other refugees trapped with him inside the refrigerated lorry.

I was overjoyed to see this ITV News at Ten report on the Amar Foundation’s fantastic work helping women & girls who were kidnapped by ISIS recover from their trauma.

The report shows the practical positive impact the charity’s Escaping Darkness appeal is having on the ground, two years after it was launched in response to the huge public reaction to Escape from ISIS.

And it features the one and only Khaleel! I haven’t seen him for a long time, great to know he’s still hard at work trying to bring all the women and girls back to safety.

Keep up the good work everybody. Here’s to the day when all those young women have been brought safely home.

We’re all delighted to announce that OKSIJAN has been accepted into the BFI London Film Festival! We’re one of about 100 shorts that will be playing across the eleven day programme It’s a great honour and accolade for the hard work the whole team put in.

The film is screening on October 5th at the Curzon Soho and Friday 6th at NFT2, as part of the ‘Thrill of the Chase’ showcase. Grab them quickly because they’re selling fast!

Oksijan is an independent short film based on the incredible true story of a seven-year old Afghan refugee’s battle to survive as he was smuggled to the UK in the back of a refrigerated lorry and the air inside began to run out.

We have already shot the film, with a fantastic cast including rising British star Ella Purnell, and an award-winning crew including the cinematographer of Oscar-winning short Stutterer. Now we need your help to get us over the line!

All money raised will help to pay for the edit, post-production and distribution, giving this film a chance to be as good as it can be and spread its message of hope far and wide.

So please share our campaign with your networks – use the indiegogo “share” feature and tag us #OKSIJANfilm to help us spread the word

Also please likeour Facebook Page and follow us on Twitter we’ll keep you up-to-date with our progress @oksijanfilm

I’m proud to have made a small contribution to this important campaign by the fantastic charity Help Refugees.

They gathered a number of Britain’s leading lights including Rita Ora, Jamie Callum, the Freud sisters and Richard Rogers to step forward and talk about their origins as refugees who fled to this country.

When you consider all they have achieved and contributed, just think what today’s refugees might do if we only gave them a chance.

Despite everything she suffered, Nadia has been tireless in her efforts to raise awareness of the plight of young women held in sexual slavery by ISIS, thousands of whom still remain in captivity – in the video above, you can see her testify before the UN Security Council, and she has met Presidents and Prime Ministers around the world. The impact of her story is overwhelming. She has been accompanied and supported by Khaleel’s wife, Amena.

I could not be happier to announce two award nominations and one win for the Escape from ISIS team.

First off, my fantastic fixer Hassan Ashwor has won the prestigious Martin Adler award from the Rory Peck Trust for his tireless work supporting international coverage of the conflict with ISIS – including of course his indispensable support for me on Escape from ISIS. Couldn’t have done it without him, so well done Hassan.

The film has also been nominated in the Best Feature Documentary Category at the Foreign Press Association Awards, alongside brilliant work by film-makers like Dan Edge and Nick Read, two of the best Directors around.

Finally, I am also extremely honoured to let you know that I have been nominated for the Best Non-Fiction Director of 2015 by the Royal Television Society. As many of you know, I won’t be in the country when the winner is announced at the ceremony on November 30th – but keep your fingers crossed!